


One Gay at a Time

by Tolpen



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Queer Eye for the Straight Guy RPF
Genre: Don't copy to another site, Other Additional Tags to Be Added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-31
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2020-10-03 23:30:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20461310
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tolpen/pseuds/Tolpen
Summary: Old single father with a non-existent self-esteem has to crawl out of his hermit habits and the closet.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This work has been pitched on Sewers of Paris Discord and I have been then convinced to put it into actual writing.  
Very well then.

“Alright squad! Who are we doing this week?”

“OK, listen, this is a real treat. We are going to end this beautiful summer in… Paris! Alright, Jonathan, if you squeal into my ear like this one more time, you’re going by foot.”1

“Oh my gosh, I am so sorry, Bobby, but I can’t help it. I am so excited.”

“Yes, who wouldn’t be? Anyway, we are visiting the early 30’s Paris and-”

“Wait, wait wait,” Karamo interrupts Bobby, “You mean, during the Great Depression? That is going to suck, man. That’s going to suck.”

“If you’d let me speak-”

Antoni can’t suffer that any longer: “Oh my god, give me that.” He reaches over Jonathan for the folder and clears his throat as he starts reading: “So we are going to Paris, France, 1833, so time to brush up your French, gentlemen. The man we are giving the makeover to is called Ultime Fauchevelent, a.k.a Monsieur Jean.”

“Huh, that is weird.” Tan taps his fingers on the steering wheel, seeming only half-way listening to the conversation going on behind his back. Seeming is the imperative word here, however.

“Ultime is six feet flat, no information about his weight except ‘heavy but not fat,’” Antonio continues. “He likes gardening and walks, and is very shy of people. He doesn’t go outside of the house much. He hasn’t got any known family –” The men break into a quartet choir of sad _‘awwwwww’_s. “– Except for his daughter Cosette, who's actually nominated him. Boys, boys let me finish that, OK?”

“His daughter nominated him, that’s so gorg,” Jonathan smiles.

**!!!**

_ **[Cosette Pontmercy, Ultime’s daughter]** _

_Cosette fidgets with the hem of her blouse._

“_I am nominating Papa because he’s always been neglecting himself and… Recently I have married and Papa has gradually disappeared from my life. I haven’t seen him in a month now. I think that the realization that I am no longer his baby girl has shaken him too much and he needs some help to be himself again and not center everything around me.” She nods a few times._

**!!!**

“Guys, there are pictures!” Jonathan takes a handful of papers from the folder.

Bobby speaks as he hands around the mainly black-and-white sketches: “We didn’t get any photos, because heliography, the photography method of 1833, took at least one day of exposure. Daguerreotypes aren’t a thing yet, and there aren’t any colors in this process to speak of. So instead Cosette has sent us her sketches of her own father!”2

“Man, she really is talented,” Karamo admires the few papers that were handed to him. “Tan, take a look!”

“I’m driving; I cannot admire art right now.”

“Uh-oh, on second thought, maybe that’s for the better.”

Tan's eyes widen. “Why? Why, Karamo?”

“You don’t want to know. Oh, oh god, you don’t want to know!”

“Karamo, what is it?” Tan slaps the steering wheel and glances to the side to take a look. His voice shifts to pure horror: “What is it? Holy f#@&#$, what is that and why is it yellow?”

**!!!**

_ “Where I think he needs the most help is his fashion sense. I mean _I_ can tell that it is nonexistent and I grew up in a convent.” Cosette giggles. “I think he could be rather dashing man, even in his age, just if it wasn’t for what he wears.”_

_ She laughs again and covers her mouth with a hand clad in laced glove. It takes her a couple of seconds to regain her composure so she can continue: “I love Papa very, very, very much, but that horrible coat has to go. You’ll know it when you see it. I pray to God every day that there is no other coat like that in the world.”_

**!!!**

“Alright, aside from burning that monstrosity, what are we doing this week?” Tan has been shaking so badly for the past couple of minutes that he and Karamo have switched places, so he is turning to the rest of the Fabulous Five from the shotgun seat.

“Petting his beautiful hair?” Jonathan suggests.

“And getting adopted. He looks like a dream daddy.”

“Oh, have you played that game, Bobby?” Antoni gets rightfully elbowed for that comment.

“Well, Cosette's asking us to elevate his confidence and sense of self-worth. She would also be much happier if he went out in society and actually met people and stopped living like a hermit in general. She doesn’t directly say this, but she’d also really like to be in touch with him again,” Bobby explains as he skims through the folder.

“I’d really like for her and her dad to connect again,” Tan states flatly to the windshield.

Karamo nods: “Yes. Whatever is going on in there, it’s not healthy for either of them.”

“So, family reunion at the end of the week?”

“Yep,” Antoni pops the _‘p’_ like a party cracker. “I’m on this one with Jonathan. Family reunion. I like family reunions. And this fluffy teddy bear looks like he could use a family or two.”

* * *

1Alright, I have encountered a problem here. In order to mimic exactly how the Fab 5 speaks, the amount of italicizing, bolding and underlining would render the text unreadable. I hope you have a good hearing memory to get the most authentic experience.

2The History of Photography. _Nicéphore Niépce House Photo Museum_ [online]. Paris: Maison Nicéphore Niépce [qt. 2019-08-30]. Avaible from: http://www.photo-museum.org/photography-history/


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Fab 5 meets U. F.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, I haven't forgotten about this. Here we go.

“We're here,” Karamo proclaims cheerfully. The Fab Five rolls out of the car, stretching backs and stiff behinds.

“I don't ave anything against haunted houses,” Bobby eyes the overgrown garden, “but as amusement parks. Not places for people to live in.”

“I sense a lot of neglect here,” Jonathan joins in.

Antoni makes first to the wrought iron gate and with a lot of effort pulls it open, tearing overgrown ivy strands in the process. “Look at this. Nobody used this gate in years! Now I understand what Cosette meant by her father being a hermit.” The squad forces a laugh at that.

**!!!**

_ **[Bobby]** _

_ “We came in there and I was, like, red flags. Red flags everywhere.” He throws his hands around to demonstrate where everywhere the red flags were, which is all over the place._

_ “The house is completely hidden away from the world. Overgrown grass and trees. I couldn't make out the flowerbeds at all. The walls haven't been painted anywhere near this century. Cobwebs everywhere. If I didn't know someone lives in there, I would have thought that house abandoned. So we have an old man, recent empty-nester living in a house like this. Either this is a bad horror movie or a sign of depression.”_

_ A pause and a slow exhale. Bobby rubs his face. “I hope it's the horror.”_

**!!!**

They are greeted by an older lady in the door who introduces herself as Monsieur Fauchevelent's portess. “Monsieur is upstairs, gentlemen,” she smiles at them.

And upstairs he really is. They find him in his bedroom staring out of the window. It follows with a cacophony of “Hello” and “Hi, Ultime” and hugs. Karamo instantly makes his home on the bed while Antoni and Jonathan basically beg to be led through the garden like tourists through the city. That leaves Bobby and Tan to run wild through the adjacent rooms and wardrobe.

“Tan, Tan, look what I have found!” Bobby catches with the man in the kitchen.

Tan doesn't even have to turn around, his head only sinks between the porcelain jars for flour and sugar. “Bobby, I love you very much, but I'm not going to look at you until you take it off.”

The yellow coat is taken off... and then thrown over Tan's shoulders in a fit of mischief. Which is why a few second later Jonathan is basically ran into by Bobby as Tan chases him with a rather nasty looking broom.

Karamo chooses that moment to stroll into the garden while wearing five different wigs on his head. He is holding another two like pom-poms. Ultime is looking quite ashamed while everyone around him bust into giggling and poorly concealed laughter.

“Anybody could explain me what is going on with these wigs?” Karamo demands to know. “Are you a part of some actor congregation, Ultime?”

“Um, I... No. Well, you see.. I...”

“No, I don't see.”

**!!!**

_ **[Tan, with a curly blonde wig in his right hand]** _

_ “The house is empty. There isn't any sign of human life. The principal's office at my elementary school was more cheerful and lively place. I'm not buying 'empty for resale value' argument here at all, because this time period hasn't got that.”_

_ Tan waves the curly wig in frustration. “And then there is Ultime's wardrobe.”_

**!!!**

Karamo and Bobby have to drag the rest of the people to look through Ultime's clothes practically by brute force.

“Plain shirts, shirts, shirts. Nothing that actually fits you,” Tan throws them all out on bed. “What is this, lost and found? This is the nineteenth century! I expected some pretty waistcoats, tailcoats, coats! Stockings, even!”

“Yes, where are all the stockings?” Jonathan makes a theatre out of searching for them under the bed. “I bet I would look great in them. Stockings are so manly right now.”

Antoni smiles: “And here I thought you'd go after corsets.”

“Honey, no. Corsets are so bad for your spine and ribs, so no-no.” Jonathan shakes his head with passion and spends the next couple of minutes trying to blow the hair out of his face. Bobby and Antoni have to rescue him.

**!!!**

_ **[Jonathan, looking at the ceiling, eyes red]** _

_ “I think... I think I need a moment. I have never seen anything this sad in my life, including that time I made pizza from scratch,” he sniffs._

_ Karamo shouts in from off-screen: “But it was a great pizza!”_

_ “Yes, once we rubbed all the charcoal off it, it was,” Jonathan turns left to him and wipes his eyes with a handkerchief with U.F. Initials on it._

**!!!**

“Well, we are sorry Mademoiselle,” Karamo grins at the portess – “Mademoiselle,” Jonathan giggles in the background, “that's a great word, I love it. Bobby, can you call me Mademoiselle?” – “But we have to take Ultime with us. Bobby here is going to take over the house –”

“This place doesn't need redecorating,” Bobby muses, “it has been never decorated in the first place. Don't worry, I've got this.”

“– And we are going to take over you,” Antoni takes Ultime around shoulders.

The old man lets out quietly: “Oh no.”

**!!!**

_ **[Antoni]** _

_ “This will be a very wild week. I think we've done harder than this. But there are buried dogs here and we have to dig out all of them if we want to plant something in this beautiful garden of a man. Oh look at me, a few hours in France during the Romantic time and I already speak like some f&*#ing roman._

_ He sips from his mug and gives a bright smile from under a new cacao moustache._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Comments make the world go round!

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks for [ voidify's ](https://archiveofourown.org/users/voidify/pseuds/voidify) amazing beta work!


End file.
